"Life is very high school, just with bigger stakes," says Santana in this week's installment of Glee, 'Trio'. It's an appropriate statement for an episode that's all about desperately trying to flaunt your immaturity as real life drags you kicking and screaming.

But that's a bit of a serious summation of 'Trio'. To be honest, it's not at all fitting for this throwaway hour of... er... gleefulness. The episode's main aim is not to provoke debate or challenge the audience, it just wants to recreate the feel of those last few moments of innocence before you leave school for your 'proper life'.

Graduation is weighing heavy on the mind of Tina, who bursts into tears at the sight of Blaine and Sam in their caps and gowns. Desperate to make the most of their time together, they decide to stage an after hours choir room lock-in so that they will always have something to reminisce about.

And yeah, it's all very cute, with Blaine resurrecting his Dark Feather superhero from last season for one last outing, before the trio engage in a montage of fire extinguisher chair races and the like. Of course, for an episode where everyone's being young and non conformist, this is set to a rendition of the official anthem of teen angst, 'Don't You (Forget About Me)' by Simple Minds.

But their plan for one last fun night backfires when Becky crashes and Blaine discovers Sam and Tina aggressively making out, a random Glee hook-up that's actually believable for once due to the fact that it's meant to come out of nowhere and make no sense, and we're being forced to believe in there being real emotions present.

The shocking find sends Blaine fleeing in a fit, and he's still pissed the next day, accusing Sam and Tina of making him feel like a gooseberry on their fun night.

Their brief fall out is over rather quickly, unlike the feud between Rachel and Santana in New York, which carries through to this episode. Rachel is now living with Elliot (Adam Lambert), declaring him her "new best gay" and duetting with him on 'Barracuda' by Heart, a bit of an out there choice for Glee given that its target audience probably only faintly recognises this song from playing GTA: San Andreas. They do it well anyway, really throwing themselves into the performance, bearing their teeth and galloping along to the guitar riff.

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But soon Elliot becomes a pawn in the ladies' game of one-upmanship, as Santana moves to make friends with him, flaunts their relationship in front of Rachel at the diner and initiates a sing-off to claim ownership of him. Perhaps unsurprisingly though, Starchild decides that he doesn't want to be treated like a trophy and announces that he is forming a new band with Kurt and Dani (hey, remember Demi Lovato?!), named 'One Three Hill'.

Things thaw a little as Santana and Rachel come to the realisation that they might be each other's only girlfriends, but neither is ready to put an end to the high school dramatics and call a truce. That's a good job, really, because the temptation to make this rivalry a two-episode thing, return to the status quo and carry on cruising along at a leisurely pace must have been huge.

In a neat flip, while the youngsters of Glee are fighting to keep things the same, Will and Emma are facing an uphill struggle to move on to the next stage of their lives. The couple are trying for a baby, but things aren't going as smoothly as they'd hoped.

This story is definitely the weak point of 'Trio', small though it may be, due to some properly embarrassing dialogue, such as "the only work of art that belongs in here is the one we're going to make together" (when Will transforms the craft room into a nursery) and "the girl of your dreams probably has a more fertile womb". Then there's the bit where Will seduces Emma by serenading her with Kenny Loggins, which features shots of the two of them pulling laughably huge expressions while looking through a baby book, arm in arm. It's all so wholesome and icky. It really would not look out of place in Santana's yeast commercial. Gross.

And of course, it's all leading up to the announcement from Emma that she is finally pregnant. It comes just before the credits, suggesting it's meant to be a nice surprise, but it was clearly the only way things were going to conclude. To throw a tragic twist in at the end of an episode this lighthearted just wouldn't be right.

Instead, we're all smiles, as Blaine gets over his issues with Tina and Sam, and Artie, the other New Directions senior, gets a last minute tip of the hat as he joins the three for a performance of 'Hold On' by Wilson Phillips.

'Trio' is admittedly not an episode that's particularly important or grand, but it's hard to grumble at an episode that only wants to conjure up a few smiles by being ridiculously sweet. The surprisingly retro tracklist is a nice change of pace and aids the episode in achieving the nostalgic vibe required to save it from being totally pointless.

And although It's not really substantial, it works as an appetiser to the big farewell that's presumably coming. After all, you don't want to be feeling nauseous from overindulging in sentimentality by the time that comes around. Next week, regionals!